Noricum scandal

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The Noricum scandal or the Noricum affair is the collective term for illegal arms deliveries made by the Austrian VÖEST subsidiary Noricum in the early 1980s , which were later examined by the judiciary and a parliamentary investigative committee . The recipients of the GHN-45 artillery pieces were the two warring parties in the First Gulf War , the states of Iraq and Iran .

Illegal arms exports to warring countries

Between 1981 and 1983 Noricum supplied Iraq via the camouflaged recipient country Jordan with artillery pieces of the Gun Howitzer Noricum (GHN-45) type. Like the later arms deliveries to Iran via Libya, this was a clear violation of a recently tightened federal law that prohibited arms deliveries to warring states and, as a result, also of criminal law.

The two Gulf War parties Iran and Iraq are said to have been supplied with 340 GHN-45 guns, 140 of which are said to have gone to Iran.

Suspicion and detection

At the beginning of July 1985, the Austrian ambassador in Athens , Herbert Amry , had repeatedly informed the Austrian Foreign Ministry by telex and telegram about indications of illegal Austrian arms exports to Iran. At an international arms fair in Greece, he had seen Noricum managers negotiating with customers from warring states.

On July 12, 1985, 46-year-old Amry died under mysterious circumstances after he had previously warned his press attaché Ferdinand Hennerbichler that they both wanted to be killed because they had discovered illegal arms deals and reported them to the Austrian Foreign Ministry.

Amry's sudden death prevented his scheduled July 13th meeting with the arms dealer who had informed Amry of the illegal business.

"Official cause of death in the Amry cause: heart failure. The corpse was quickly cremated, and the true story has not yet been clarified. Amry had informed the Foreign Office in Vienna several times about his suspicions, but it is still unclear whether the telex had ever reached the then Foreign Minister Leopold Gratz . The fourth - and crucial - Amry telegram disappeared somewhere in the Home Office. The book authors Kurt Tozzer and Günther Kallinger only found an Amry lock act in the Foreign Office in 1999 in the course of research for their book Death Trap Politics . "

- The press : The super cannon from Liezen

On August 30, 1985, reporters from Basta magazine were able to take photographs of a load of cannons destined for Iran in a Yugoslav Adriatic port. At the end of 1985, Basta finally published the information available to her, thus making the Noricum scandal known to a broad public.

Political and legal consequences

In connection with the Lucona affair , but also because of the Noricum scandal, Interior Minister Karl Blecha resigned in February 1989.

The illegal arms sales and the suspicion that leading Austrian politicians were involved in the process led to the establishment of a parliamentary committee of inquiry against the votes of the SPÖ on September 27, 1989 .

The managers responsible were convicted in 1993 for endangering neutrality . Federal Chancellor Fred Sinowatz and Foreign Minister Leopold Gratz were acquitted of the politicians involved . Interior Minister Karl Blecha was convicted and received a conditional nine-month prison sentence, which was suspended for three years, for reasons including the suppression of documents.

See also

literature

  • Almost treason . In: Der Spiegel . No. 39 , 1987, pp. 149-150 ( online - 21 September 1987 ).
  • Heavy gun . In: Der Spiegel . No. 11 , 1989, pp. 187-190 ( Online - Mar. 13, 1989 ).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Noricum scandal. In: dasrotewien.at - Web dictionary of the Viennese social democracy. SPÖ Vienna (Ed.)
  2. ↑ Die Presse : The super cannon from Liezen (article from December 29, 2005).
  3. ↑ Amry's widow is unsure whether her husband died of natural causes . Upper Austrian news of April 23, 1993. p. 2.
  4. ↑ Die Presse : The super cannon from Liezen (article from December 29, 2005).
  5. ↑ Anniversary without jubilation: Noricum , burkhartlist.de
  6. ↑ Die Zeit : When Sparrows Export Cannons (Article of April 9, 1993)
  7. ↑ The press : Noricum's cannon brought death
  8. ↑ Der Standard : Interview with Karl Blecha: "Being able to forget keeps you young"